I am still around! Still baking, still taking pictures of said baking. But I moved (um, a month ago), and it took a while to find the phone cord. You know how it is.

Homemade dressing and croutons are probably more work than they’re necessarily worth, honestly. At least under normal circumstances. But if you really want to impress someone, or if you’re procrastinating on your readings, these are just the thing.

The croutons I just made up (after reading an eHow, I think — they’re really very simple), and the dressing is from The Pioneer Woman.

For the croutons, you’ll need:
a food processor (or really buff whisking arms)
olive oil
bread
garlic (I’ve used roasted garlic before, and that was super delicious, but unfortunately have no pictures)
salt
parmesan (or Romano, if that’s what you’ve got)
rosemary
…whatever else you like on your croutons.

It’s best if the bread is stale beforehand, but I couldn’t help myself and sliced up perfectly good, fresh French bread. May the French forgive me.

These make for pretty big croutons.

Now, dump all the ingredients into your food processor. I would estimate I used 2/3 cup olive oil, a solid pinch of salt and rosemary, a bunch of cheese, and probably five cloves of garlic. I am a garlic fiend.

Whir it all together. Preferably during daylight hours, so that you don’t tick off the guy living below you.

Dump it all in a bowl with your bread squares, and toss well. You want every bit of bread to have a decent helping of the oil mixture.

Yum.

Spread them out on a foil-lined baking sheet. Trust me on the foil.

Bake them at a very low temperature, about 250F, for a very long time, until they’re completely dried out and look as glorious as this.

As for the dressing!

You’ll need:
a food processor (for real this time; a blender would also do the job)
several cloves of garlic
2 tablespoons of mustard
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
juice from half a lemon
half a cup of olive oil
half a cup of parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste

Pretend you cleaned your food processor between the croutons and this, and dump all your ingredients in there.

It will not look like Caesar dressing from a bottle. This will worry you.

Then you will stick your finger in to taste it, and then the weird white bottled stuff will worry you.

Wash your only bowl, chop up some Romaine, and live happily ever after.